Andrey Melnichenko, billionaire and owner of EuroChem Group AG, strolls in between sessions on day 3 of theSt Petersburg International Economic Forum inSt Petersburg, Russia, on Friday, June 4, 2021.
Andrey Rudakov|Bloomberg|Getty Images
The war in Ukraine is a catastrophe that needs to be stopped or there will be a worldwide food crisis, as fertilizer costs worldwide are currently too expensive for lots of farmers, Russia’s coal and fertilizer king Andrei Melnichenko stated on Monday.
Several of Russia’s wealthiest entrepreneurs have actually openly required peace given that President Vladimir Putin bought the intrusion onFeb 24, consisting of Mikhail Fridman, Pyotr Aven and Oleg Deripaska.
The United States and its European allies cast Putin’s intrusion as an imperial-style land grab that has actually up until now been badly performed due to the fact that Moscow under-estimated Ukrainian resistance and Western willpower to penalize Russia.
The West has actually approved Russian entrepreneurs, consisting of European Union sanctions on Melnichenko, frozen state properties and cut off much of the Russian business sector from the international economy in an effort to force Putin to alter course.
Putin declines to.
“The events in Ukraine are truly tragic. We urgently need peace,” Melnichenko, 50, who is Russian however was born in Belarus and has a Ukrainian mom, informed Reuters in a declaration emailed by his representative.
“As a Russian by nationality, a Belarusian by birth, and a Ukrainian by blood, I feel great pain and disbelief witnessing brotherly peoples fighting and dying.”
Russia’s intrusion of Ukraine has actually eliminated thousands, displaced more than 2 million individuals, and raised worries of a broader fight in between Russia and the United States, the world’s 2 most significant nuclear powers.
Putin states Russians and Ukrainians are basically one individuals which a “special military operation” was required due to the fact that the United States was utilizing Ukraine to threaten Russia while Russian- speakers were being maltreated in Ukraine.
“One of the victims of this crisis will be agriculture and food,” stated Melnichenko, who established Uralchem, Russia’s biggest ammonium nitrate manufacturer which is based in Zug, Switzerland, and SUEK, Russia’s leading coal manufacturer.
“It has already led to soaring prices in fertilizers which are no longer affordable to farmers.”
Melnichenko stated a supply chain currently interrupted by Covid-19 was now much more distressed. “Now it will lead to even higher food inflation in Europe and likely food shortages in the world’s poorest countries,” he stated.
